Protective Feathers
by Ajalea
Summary: Laki is visiting Conis because she has a surprise for the blonde. But where is Conis actually and what is Laki's surprise? Does it have anything to do with all those glasses with water at Conis' room? Well, maybe. This is my humble piece for the Share the Love Month, I hope you enjoy it :) (LakiConis-ish)


**Here's my story for the Share the Love Month :D This is my first female ship fic and I kinda like it myself / I actually finished this two weeks ago, but it needed a lot of editing(probably still needs it) and thanks to my lovely beta, it has come to this! ^^ The theme was 'Elements' and I hope I used it well :)**

**Anyway, enjoy~**

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Laki came rushing in. "Where is she?" She was breathing quickly. A young woman behind the desk answered, knowing the woman in front of her. "In her room, Miss."

The black haired woman nodded in response. "Right, thank you." Without catching her breath, she rushed straight to the stairs, climbing them to the third floor. Normally they'd meet in the family room, though today that wasn't happening. She had never actually entered the room of the person she was visiting, but she knew precisely where it was. Laki didn't want to waste any second by being polite, but she was raised well and knocked on the door.

"Conis, are you there? I'm coming in." Laki entered without waiting for a response. Before she could see anything, she was stopped by an old man in a white coat. A doctor, probably.

"Are you looking for Miss Conis? She isn't here I'm afraid," the doctor said agonizingly slow.

Panic took a hold of Laki's mind. "Then, where is she?"

"I remember she was going to take a shower, about an hour ago, but I haven't seen her since."

Laki thought for a moment, the panic blocking her thoughts a little. "Where are the showers?"

The doctor pulled an eyebrow, but didn't say anything about Laki wanting to visit Conis when she was showering. "If you want to see Miss Conis, just follow his hallway until the end, go left and then it's the… third door on your right. You can't miss it as it says 'showers'."

"Thank you." Laki dashed off without saying anything else. With her feet barely touching the ground, Laki ran until she stood in front of the right door. She knocked, but again didn't wait for an answer. After opening the door, Laki could hear water falling on the floor of the shower, meaning Conis was still in there. No second was wasted by the black haired woman for her to check on the woman she was visiting. What she saw concerned her though.

"Conis, are you okay?" Laki rushed to the figure in the shower. Conis was sitting on the ground, her back turned to Laki, her legs in an awkward position on the floor. Her head was bowed down, like she was crying. It was something Laki couldn't see clearly, because of the running shower. Not noting her own clothes getting wet, the blackhead sat down behind the other, touching her shoulder to let her know she was there too. Conis' head appeared from between her arms and she looked around. Laki saw her eyes were red, so she really had been crying for god knows how long. Recognizing Laki, the blonde turned around and hung her arms around Laki's neck. That hurt her back a little, but Laki didn't mention it. They didn't speak for several minutes, until Laki figured she was wet enough already and removed Conis' arms. It wasn't like she hadn't already seen the naked body in front of her, but she still looked away out of respect. Her eyes focusing somewhere else, Laki put out the shower, grabbed a towel and handed it to Conis.

"Please dry yourself." Noticing Conis had wrapped the towel around her body, Laki looked at her again. "I'll be just behind that screen, so there's no reason to panic, okay?"

Conis only nodded, but that was enough. It took long for Conis to dress herself and when she was finished, Laki quickly took action so Conis couldn't struggle too much.

Carefully and fast, Laki put Conis' arm around her own shoulder, one of her own behind Conis' back and her other behind the blonde's knees. She lifted the woman like she weighed nothing.

Taking the same route back, Laki encountered none of the personnel. She didn't mind that in the least. No one would be asking questions why she was carrying Conis to her room. Arrived, the black haired woman put the other woman on her feet, so she could open the door.

Behind that door was quite a normal room, it didn't look like a hospital room at all. The bed looked like the one Conis used when she still lived with her dad and the table and chairs seemed used, but almost radiated a homey feel. The only thing that wasn't really normal was the water. Or all the glasses filled with water to be exact. They stood everywhere, on the table, the cabinets, on every flat space you could find in the room. The only places completely water-free were Conis' bed and her small couch. On the floor there was a small path to walk, but that was all the free space there was.

Laki hadn't seen it before, but he had heard from a nurse that Conis always grabbed a few glasses from the kitchen when it was raining and filled those glasses with rainwater. Apparently, her small balcony (which she couldn't enter without someone of the staff present as it was locked) caught a lot of rain. For a moment Laki looked outside, her eyes focused on the balcony. There were half filled glasses standing there. The water was present everywhere.

At one of the many times Laki had visited before, Conis had told her she did this because it enabled her to trap God. According to her, He was vain and would look at the water, using it as a mirror, and this would lead His attention away from her for some time. He would look into every glass, so the more Conis had standing in her room, the safer she felt.

Everyone let her be. The first time Conis collected the water, someone had tried to remove the glasses, causing the blond woman to have an emotional breakdown.

Laki gently pushed Conis to her bed. There was a small path from the bed to the door, and one to the couch, the only places where there weren't any raindrops collected. She looked at the 'sick' person and moved the wet hair out of her face. Meanwhile her mind wandered to a certain happening, a few months back.

It had been a normal day, just like any other. Bad weather had been predicted, but Laki hadn't thought that was enough reason to cancel going to the aquarium with Conis. The latter had been so excited to go and Laki couldn't really say no to her. She never had. They had fun. Neither had ever been there before, so they really enjoyed the sharks, penguins, dolphins, seahorses and other animals. In the souvenir shop, Laki bought Conis a beautiful seashell, one that could let you hear the sound of the ocean and some kind of hair accessory with two bobbling sea anemones on top. Conis loved both of them.

They hadn't noticed at all, but when they came outside, it was storming. With quick feet they ran to Laki's house. The rain was pouring down, they were drenched in seconds. To get to Laki's home, Conis and Laki had to cross a park, now entirely empty except for the storm and the two women.

It was then that Conis was hit. Laki had been running a few steps behind Conis and she was blinded for a split second (though her vision remained blurry for another few seconds). At the almost exact same moment she heard an extremely loud crash, like someone had decided to drop a hundred metal pipes on each other next to her ears. Blinking a few times, Laki looked around after regaining her vision. It seemed darker after that blinding light and her eyes had to adjust for a bit. Only then she saw Conis lying on the ground. Something smoky swirled up from her unmoving body. Panicking, Laki tried to wake her, but failed. In a haze she called an ambulance, something she later on didn't even remember due to the panic.

Conis remained unconscious for a full week. The doctors couldn't say anything for sure about any brain damage from the lightning strike. Her body had taken considerable damage. A few burns but above all a scar in the form of lightning that covered almost her whole back.

When Conis woke up, she had only a bit of memory loss (which, according to the doctor, was normal after a weeklong coma) and aside from that, she seemed perfectly healthy. It was only a few days later that Laki discovered something had changed. Conis, who had never believed in any religion, started to talk about a God. When Laki asked about it, Conis only gave some vague answers. It took Laki weeks to figure out the whole story behind Conis' weird talking.

Conis thought the lightning resembled a god and his name was Enel. She didn't know why, but apparently he started talking to her in her head, in a way that only she could hear. According to Conis, it only happened when it rained.

With her stories about Enel, Conis began acting more and more strange. She could suddenly talk to an invisible person, even in the middle of a conversation. At night, Conis suffered from nightmares, waking her up at least twice a night. After a while, she had be careful with what she was saying when around the blonde. A lot of normal expressions could make her suddenly upset, angry, sad or even everything at once.

Pagaya never stopped apologizing, to Conis, but also to Laki, who had seen everything, like it was his fault even though it absolutely wasn't. It took a while, but eventually Pagaya couldn't even look his daughter in the eye anymore after several severe outbursts, breakdowns and the continuous weird talking. In the end, either of them would freak out from just being near each other and so they decided to move Conis to a hospital. She had become a danger to herself and neither Pagaya or Laki could do anything about it.

It wasn't really a hospital, it was a huge building where people lived who couldn't live by themselves, and were a danger to themselves, and Conis was one of them. Laki visited as much as she could, but could never stay long. It hurt her and she knew Conis didn't like it either.

"Conis?" Laki asked quietly, her mind returning to the present. She patiently waited until the other looked up. "I want to show you something." To show she meant something nice, Laki smiled. It seemed to calm down the blonde a little.

It had been a sunny day, though Laki wore a long sleeved shirt. Focused on not making any sudden movements to upset Conis, the black haired woman pulled off her shirt, revealing a black top she was still wearing. Conis remained quiet, though her eyes showed she didn't understand why Laki did that.

"Sit still, okay?" Laki asked and Conis nodded. "I know you're scared of Enel and I've made sure you don't have to be anymore," Laki continued. Slowly, she got up, careful not to push over any glasses and showed the frightened looking blonde her back. Laki heard a small gasp and felt the air move a little when Conis moved her hands to cover her face. She smiled a little at the reaction. It was the one she hoped for after all.

Finally, Conis spoke. "Are those really… wings?"

Laki turned her head. "Yes." She replied. The blackhead turned a little more to look the other in the eye, who was staring at her back like she couldn't believe what she saw.

A couple days prior to this day Laki had decided she wanted to do something for Conis. She had visited multiple times, but it always didn't seem enough for the both of them. Ever since she left Conis the first time, Laki felt guilty for leaving her behind, knowing she couldn't take her home no matter what. The blonde wasn't even allowed outside, since the people working with her were afraid she would run away. Just as the rest of the people here, Conis could only get visitors during the visiting hours, though Laki wanted to surprise her completely. She'd went into a tattoo shop, one that Wiper had recommended for her, and she had asked about tattooing a pair of wings on her shoulders. After a few sketches, the tattoo artist and Laki agreed on a beautiful angel like pattern with an incredible amount of detail in the feathers.

The moment she walked out of the shop, it started to rain, like Enel was angry at her for trying to protect Conis. Well, if he existed anyway.

Her back took a few days to recover from the fresh tattoo, though she still had to be extremely careful with it, and then she called the 'hospital' to ask if she could come over to see Conis.

"They're beautiful." It was a whisper, but clearly audible.

"I'm glad you like them. But you should know that I will protect you with these wings from Enel. So you don't have to fill all those glasses anymore, you understand?" Though Laki's voice sounded strict, her face only radiated warmth. She sat down again, next to Conis and the blonde woman jumped at her. The moment Conis' arms touched Laki's shoulders for the hug, small raindrops started to fall onto the ground, a small threat from a –nonexistent– god. But Conis was not afraid anymore. Laki was protecting her, after all.


End file.
